The History of Television
1. "Using Electricity to See Things" - Television Major Events
From the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century, "Using electricity to see things" ” is the dream of many scientists. To this end, they have made outstanding efforts. At that time, they had no idea that the thing they were about to invent was called television.
Looking back at the invention of television, we find that television was not invented suddenly by one person on a certain day, but was the result of decades of work by many scientists and inventors.
The following are the major events of the invention of television:
1844, cable telegraph:
May 24, 1844, American Samuel Morse A sentence was transmitted via telegraph code from Washington, D.C., to Baltimore, Maryland: "What on earth did God create?" A copper wire ran between the two places, only 20 miles apart, but this marked the beginning of a new era of modern communications.
In 1895, wireless telegraphy:
In 1864, Scotsman James Clark Kerswell proposed the theory of the existence of electromagnetic waves. In 1888, the German Heinrich Hertz proved the existence of electromagnetic waves in the laboratory. Therefore, the frequency of electromagnetic wave vibration is named after "Hertz". We call it radio waves today.
The Italian Guglielmo Marconi made a device that produced radio waves. He successfully sent a wireless telegraph in 1895, arousing great enthusiasm for the future of radio.
In 1906, wireless broadcast:
In 1904, British physicist J. Ambrose Fleming invented the electron tube. In 1906, American de Forest improved Fleming's diode into a triode. On Christmas Eve that year, the telegraph operator of the ship sailing on the Atlantic received Christmas songs from the wireless broadcast, which was sent by R.A. Ferguson from Massachusetts, USA. Vacuum tubes were later replaced by transistors, making receivers smaller and more reliable.
By the end of 1922, more than 500 radio stations in the United States had started broadcasting, and as many as 2 million home radios had been sold. By 1930, more than 50 countries and regions in the world had radio stations.
In 1935, EA Armstrong invented a radio broadcast that was not subject to lightning interference—frequency modulation (FM), which could also be used to transmit television signals.
1925, mechanical television system:
On October 2, 1925, British scientist John Logie Baird used the mechanical television he invented to successfully launch And the experiment of receiving television pictures, he was called the "Father of Television" by later generations. But before him, many scientists made important inventions that laid the foundation for his mechanical television system. These scientists are: Swedish scientist Brzells who discovered the chemical element selenium, British scientist Joseph May who invented the photoelectric effect of selenium, German scientist Paul Nipkov who invented the mechanical scanning compass to solve the problem of image transmission, and invented the electronic picture tube Russian professor Boris Rozin and others. According to statistics, from 1919 to 1925, scientists from various countries filed more than 100 invention patent applications related to television.
In 1927, Bell Telephone Laboratories in the United States used cable transmission between New York and Washington to transmit television programs and broadcast a speech by then-Federal Commerce Secretary Herbert Hoover. In 1932, British scientist Huenberg invented the electronic television camera tube. In 1921, P.T. Farnworth, a 15-year-old American boy, showed his sketch of an electronic television system to his teacher. Nine years later, he obtained a patent for the electronic television device. Electronic television quickly replaced mechanical television systems.
1936, TV station:
November 2, 1936, is an important day in the history of television development. On this day, the British Broadcasting Corporation established the world's first television station in London and officially broadcast television programs. We usually think of this as the beginning of television. Other countries that had television stations in the 1930s were the former Soviet Union and the United States, both in 1939.
However, the outbreak of World War II in the same year greatly hindered the development of television. After the war, the television industry quickly entered a period of prosperity. France, the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, Poland, Italy, Mexico, Cuba, Argentina, Venezuela, Canada, Dominica, Japan, the Philippines and other countries established television stations between 1949 and 1953.
Color TV in 1954:
The first generation of electronic TV was black and white TV. From the 1920s to the 1950s, scientists and engineers worked on color television. In 1954, the United States officially broadcast color television programs, becoming the first country in the world to launch color television. In the 1960s, Japan, Canada, France, the Federal Republic of Germany, the former Soviet Union, and the United Kingdom also launched color TV. By 1991, 150 of the 169 countries and regions in the world had established TV stations, of which 142 broadcast color TV, including China.
China’s TV in 1958:
China’s TV started in 1958. On May 1, Beijing Television, the predecessor of CCTV, began to test broadcast television programs. It will be officially broadcast on September 2. Early television programs were very simple, mostly newsreels and documentaries, so some people call this period the "News Documentary Era." There were also very few TV viewers because TV coverage was extremely low. The initial coverage was only half that of Beijing, and at that time there were only 50 TV sets in Beijing. No one knew who the TV announcer was, and in that era, there were no TV stars.
The golden age of China’s television development was in the 1980s. Reform and opening up and economic growth have finally given television an opportunity to develop rapidly. In 1980, there were 38 TV stations in the country, and by 1990, there were 509. In 1980, only 0.9 of every 100 people in the country had a television, but by 1990, an average of 16 of every 100 people had a television. In 1995, there were 837 TV stations, and nearly 300 million people in China had TV sets. About 86.2% of the country's population now has access to television. Unlike in the 1950s and 1960s, most people cannot watch CCTV programs.
In 1962, satellite and television broadcasting:
When microwave technology is used for long-distance transmission, television broadcasting is often affected by geographical and climatic conditions. Therefore, after the 1960s, , countries use communication satellites to transmit television programs. On July 10, 1962, the United States launched the world's first communications satellite, Telestar 1, which transmitted television programs to the other side of the Atlantic.
The International Satellite Communications Organization was established in 1964. The first international commercial geostationary satellite "Intersat 1" was launched on April 6 to transmit radio and television programs between North America and Europe. Some experts pointed out that "Intersat 1" marked that the world has officially entered the era of satellite communications.
On July 20, 1969, the American "Apollo" spacecraft landed on the moon. Television broadcast the moon landing live via satellite. Approximately 723 million people in 47 countries and regions around the world watched the satellite TV broadcast.
Since 1984, our country has also begun to launch satellites or rent foreign satellites to improve television coverage. By 1990, the first and second programs of CCTV were transmitted by domestic satellites, and the first and second programs of Educational Television were transmitted by leased international communication satellites. In April of the same year, China also launched the Asia-1 satellite for Asia Communications Satellite Corporation. In October 1992, CCTV's fourth program was officially broadcast through the "Asia 1" satellite, and the programs could be transmitted to Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan. In 1996, in addition to CCTV, 17 local TV stations across the country had their programs broadcast on satellite.
Today, new inventions are emerging one after another, and we have long been accustomed to this, so we simply cannot imagine the shock, surprise and ecstasy that an invention at that time brought to people. Morse invented the telegraph. A local newspaper wrote: "People hundreds of miles apart can talk to each other instantly. This earth-shattering event cannot be believed unless you have experienced it yourself."
At that time, many people gathered around the office, and they promised to "keep quiet, not crowded, and didn't care whether they could understand, but just wanted to take a look and tell others that they had seen the telegraph machine." In 1858, when the Atlantic submarine cable connected the United States and Europe, a grand celebration parade broke out in New York, and there were many exciting scenes. On November 2, 1936, when the British Broadcasting Corporation officially broadcast a television program for the first time, the actors sang a "Song of Television" to celebrate the birth of television:
This wonderful and mysterious light beam,
This is our story.
The sounds and images here are transmitted to you from space
Bringing you a surprise and novelty...
People generally believe that the invention of telegraph and radio will Change people's lives and in turn change the world. As Morse predicted, "Soon, the surface of this country will be covered with 'nerves', transmitting what is happening everywhere at lightning speed, and the people of the entire country will seem to be as close as next to each other."
Through the journey of wired telegraph, wireless telegraph, wireless broadcast, mechanical television system, electronic television, color television and satellite television, the dream of our predecessors to "use electricity to see things" has finally come true. Not only that, TV has also greatly shortened the distance in space and time. We are really "as close as next to each other".
2. The days without TV
Today, watching TV has become as common as eating and sleeping, so we have almost forgotten the days without TV.
Before there was television, we read news from radio and newspapers, and we relied on movies, magazines and other media for entertainment. At that time, life was completely different. There isn’t that much information to know, there aren’t that many celebrities to hold our attention, there isn’t that much entertainment to keep us entertained, and certainly not that many TV series to bore or bore us.
In some remote mountainous areas, there are still no televisions. I visited such a village in 1991. There are only two television sets in the entire village, but they are just decorations. Because when the TV is turned on, people can only see "snowflakes" but not images. TV signals cannot yet reach villages in the mountains. But people are so eager to learn about the outside world. The cable broadcast repairman in the village is a young man in his 30s. Every day, he insisted on listening to cable radio, wrote the news of the Gulf War on a wooden board at the entrance of the village, and revised his "Gulf War Situation Map" according to changes in the war situation. When interviewing children in the village, I was surprised to find that they all knew about the Gulf War.
The village does not have television, but it stubbornly maintains contact with the outside world through cable radio and newspapers. It's a pity that all news is filtered by this maintenance man. I think if people have the opportunity to watch TV, they all hope to see the news with their own eyes. When they need to make a choice, they can choose for themselves instead of others making the choice for them. But when you can’t watch the news yourself, it’s great to have someone tell you the news.
I have also seen cottages that have no TV and are very closed. I went to such a cottage in 1992 and I couldn't believe my eyes. We live a very primitive life in the village, without television, radio or newspapers. Some children saw us muttering, and then shouted loudly: "They are Americans", "Americans are the enemy", "Get them out of the stockade". We left here amidst the flying rocks. "Americans are the enemy" was still a slogan during the Cold War in the 1950s. Sino-US relations have already entered a new period, but they know nothing about it. In the same year, I met a middle school student wearing a "Walkman" in Shanghai. He told me that he was going to study in the United States. Children from the same country and the same generation have such different understandings of the United States.
In May 1996, I went to a village in the mountains of Hebei Province to interview a 17-year-old vocational and technical school student. He is at home on vacation. A group of us went to the fields with him. The empty mountains, barren land, and the faint sound of mountain cannons from far away made me feel like I was in another world. But when I returned to his house, the TV was on, and I suddenly felt that I was still in the original world.
Jing Yidan, Zhao Zhongxiang, and Ni Ping, who we are familiar with, are chatting on TV. There are photos of Hong Kong and Taiwan singers on the wall at home... It is TV that connects us. The boy told us that he especially likes to watch CCTV’s news programs, “Military World” and Hebei Channel’s “Defense Quarter Hour”.
If the population coverage rate of TV is 86.2%, then there are still about 24% of the population in our country. In other words, there are at least 300 million people still living without TV. Without television, there would be no rapid dissemination of information, no impact of new ideas, and no opportunities for education, economy, cooperation, and exchanges. For teenagers, television is an important channel to understand the outside world. It is almost impossible to overestimate the enormous impact television has had on our lives. In modern society, whether one can place oneself in a wider world to seek development can lead to a completely different destiny.
No matter how many shortcomings television has, we cannot live without television unless we discover a better communication medium than television.
3. The future of television
In this section we will describe the technological development of future television. Some of these technologies are being tested, while others are already mature.
◆Cable TV
Sometimes we also call it cable TV. It evolved from the national antenna system and is a relatively independent television transmission network. Scientists began to study cable television, mainly to solve the problem of television reception in mountainous and remote areas. In these areas, including areas with high-rise buildings in cities, there are always "snowflakes" or "horizontal and vertical streaks" on the TV screen, making it difficult for people to see the image clearly. The way to solve this problem is to use a better receiving antenna to receive wireless TV signals, and then use wired methods to connect it to the TV sets in our homes to form a TV network. In the 1950s and 1960s, cable TV experiments were conducted abroad. After the launch of geosynchronous communication satellites in the 1970s, cable TV was able to transmit television programs through satellites, which greatly increased the number of program packages transmitted. In order to watch these television programs, households without reception problems also applied to join the cable network. In the mid-1980s, my country began to experiment with cable TV. By 1992, we were still not comfortable with premium cable TV. A Beijing audience survey that year showed that nearly 40% of viewers said they were unwilling or unwilling to spend an extra 5 or 6 yuan a month to watch cable TV. But today, we have seen that if conditions permit, many families are willing to join the cable TV network. By the end of 1996, the number of cable TV network users has reached 50 million, of course in order to see more and better TV programs. .
◆Teletext
Teletext is a new technology developed since the 1970s and is the most developed in Europe. Teletext was first developed so that people who were hearing-impaired could watch television. Researchers envision using the gaps between TV scans to transmit text and graphic data so that hearing-impaired people can smoothly understand TV programs. In other words, behind a group of programs broadcast on TV, there is another group of programs that is also being broadcast at the same time. If you have a teletext decoding chip, you can see this group of programs. Receiving teletext requires special receiving equipment.
Like the development of cable television, the development of teletext has gradually deviated from its original intention. It can indeed solve the problem of hearing-impaired people watching TV, but more importantly, it uses this technology to greatly expand the scope of picture content and services. Teletext provides news, entertainment information, sports results, weather forecasts, stock market quotes, travel services, shopping information, program previews, traffic information, etc. Viewers watching teletext are just like reading newspapers and magazines, and they can freely choose which "page" to read. The unit of teletext is also "page". Teletext in the UK and Germany is about 300 pages, and in the Netherlands and Italy is about 900 pages.
my country Central Television began to officially broadcast teletext programs on November 28, 1994. At present, graphic programs from CCTV Channels 1 and 3, Beijing TV Station, Jiangsu TV Station, and Radio and Television Information Centers in Zhejiang, Sichuan, Shandong, Guangdong, Liaoning, Jilin and other places have begun broadcasting.
How far are we from digital TV? On April 4, 1997, the U.S. Federal Communications Commission issued free digital television broadcast operating licenses to the four major television companies (ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX). By 2006, the entire United States will cancel the old television system, which means that the current 270 million television sets in the United States will become garbage in eight years. It is still unknown when my country will be able to popularize digital TV. Some experts suggest that it will take a period of transition, that is, a receiving device can be used to receive signals from the old television system and also receive signals from digital television. Some experts also raised the issue of "money". Indeed, the development of digital TV requires a large amount of funds. This ongoing revolution is both an opportunity and a challenge for us.
The future of television is still undecided and remains a controversial issue.